Schienle Anne, Wabnegger Albert, Schöngassner Florian, Leutgeb Verena
Clinical Psychology, University of Graz, BioTechMedGraz, Graz, Austria
Clinical Psychology, University of Graz, BioTechMedGraz, Graz, Austria.
Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2015 Oct;10(10):1424-8. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsv034. Epub 2015 Mar 25.
The amygdala and the parietal cortex play a key role in the neural representation of personal space. Although the concept of personal space is clinically very relevant for borderline personality disorder (BPD), especially in affective contexts, it has not been investigated thus far with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). In this fMRI study, 25 female BPD patients and 25 healthy women were exposed to photos of angry, disgusted and neutral facial expressions. All stimuli were once shown as still photos, and once were zoomed-in in order to simulate intrusion into one's own personal space. Approaching faces generally provoked activation of the amygdala and the somatosensory cortex. BPD patients showed an increased activation within both regions, but only toward approaching disgusted faces. Their amygdala activation in this specific condition positively correlated with self-disgust scores. Moreover, the clinical group indicated an enhanced personal distance preference, which was associated with parietal activation. The present study revealed altered personal space processing of BPD patients, especially in situations that relate to social contexts involving disgust. Future studies should focus on the temporal stability of personal space processing during the natural course of BPD as well as during therapy.
杏仁核和顶叶皮质在个人空间的神经表征中起着关键作用。尽管个人空间的概念在临床上与边缘型人格障碍（BPD）密切相关，尤其是在情感背景下，但迄今为止尚未通过功能磁共振成像（fMRI）进行研究。在这项fMRI研究中，25名女性BPD患者和25名健康女性观看了愤怒、厌恶和中性面部表情的照片。所有刺激物都曾以静态照片的形式展示过一次，并且有一次被放大以模拟对个人空间的侵犯。接近的面孔通常会引发杏仁核和体感皮层的激活。BPD患者在这两个区域的激活均有所增加，但仅针对接近的厌恶面孔。在这种特定情况下，他们杏仁核的激活与自我厌恶得分呈正相关。此外，临床组表现出更强的个人距离偏好，这与顶叶激活有关。本研究揭示了BPD患者个人空间处理的改变，尤其是在与涉及厌恶的社会背景相关的情况下。未来的研究应关注BPD自然病程以及治疗期间个人空间处理的时间稳定性。
